We recently connected with Enrique Pallares and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Enrique, thanks for sitting with us today to chat about topics that are relevant to so many. One of those topics is communication skills, because we live in an age where our ability to communicate effectively can be like a superpower. Can you share how you developed your ability to communicate well?
I fell in love with language. I love words. I think about them all the time—how they sound, what they mean, how none of them (not even synonyms) mean exactly the same thing. I think, speak, and dream in English and Spanish indistinctively and think about translation often. This led me to study literature first and then get a Ph.D. in philosophy.
There are two obvious aspects to communication: reading and writing/speaking. But too often we forget that the former shapes the latter. Nobody can be a good communicator without being a good reader, but what this means is not so immediately apparent. One can “read” a book and one can *read* a book. In the case of the first, you move quickly, and try to “get to the point.” But *reading* means doing it closely and slowly. It requires rereading, stopping, and returning. It takes patience because you often have to leave your moment in time and your prejudices in order to understand a completely different reality from a different era. This includes understanding that entire conceptions of the universe change over time and through places. A good reader doesn’t bring the book to themselves, but travels to the world the book, meets the book on its terms, makes an effort to get to know it and know the person that wrote it. Therefore, proper reading is a fundamentally selfless activity. It is one of self-giving and of going beyond our limits. But what is curious is that the journey teaches you more about yourself than anything else can. Because you find that beneath the different platitudes there is a deep similarity and companionship with other people throughout time. You encounter that the most bizarre aspects of your interior life are not so unique to you, but are rather shared with others and illuminated by the other’s actions and reflections. You come out of the experience a changed person. You come out of it being able to think and organize your thoughts more clearly, being able to name things that you thought had no name. You come out of it understanding previously imperceptible nuances of reality. You literally see and understand more of reality and with more detail.
The great tragedy of those who do not *read* is that they truly do not understand what they are missing. The great American writer, David Foster Wallace once told a story in a commencement speech where two young fish are placidly swimming in the ocean when an old fish swims by and says, “Good morning boys. How’s the water?” The two young fish looked at each other puzzled and said, “What the heck is water?” This is precisely what reading is about: seeing the fullness of reality. Reading is the essential nourishment of good communication. No matter what you do in life, no matter what profession you choose or what paths you take, persons are creatures of language. And since we cannot escape the beautiful burden of living with language, at a very early age, I chose to embrace it.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
As I’ve said before, I always write and spend a lot of time with books, which are at the core of who I am. But these days I am deeply focused on my mission of spreading *aperitivo* culture in the U.S. My brother Felipe and I started with this dream long ago. We learned from years of spending an inordinate amount of time in bars, cafes, restaurants, terraces, piazzas, pubs, and tavernas throughout South America, Europe and the U.S., and we want to share this beautiful way of life through our different projects.
We have a winery called Casa Carmen–which includes a small *vermutería* and tapas bar in Chestertown, MD, and a biodynamic farm, vineyard, and tasting room in West Grove, PA. We live on the farm with our families, animals, plants, and books. Along with our friend, John Levenberg, and his family, we started The Wine Collective in 2019, which is an amazing winery production facility, vermouth, wine, and tapas bar in Baltimore, MD.
During that time, we developed Vermútino, a brand of premium, natural vermouth and canned aperitivo spritzers. We are now distributed in all the East Coast, and growing quickly. This is very exciting because I believe we are in the perfect time to fall in love with vermouth and aperitivos in the U.S. People here have discovered a love for botanicals, lower alcohol cocktails, and high quality drinks that are the perfect complement to a deeply intentional and culinary lifestyle. Vermouth—in places like Spain, Italy, or Argentina—is already the center of this way of life, and our mission is to spread that to this country.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Curiosity
Too often we hear nonsense that reduces us to arbitrary labels and categories. We are told that some people are STEM people, while others are language or arts people, and others are athletes. I always have and always will resist this pseudo-psychology. Rather than trying to fit into a category, I’ve always tried to maintain a relentless curiosity about things and experiences that I encounter regardless of what they are, sometimes, without a doubt, to a fault. It is true that there are people with more ability for some things than others. But more often than not, I think that if we maintain a relentless, almost childish curiosity, we surprise ourselves with what we can learn and fall in love with. And if we don’t surprise ourselves or do so in a negative way, there is plenty to learn from that too. This doesn’t just apply to “interests” but also to personality traits like I being an introvert or an extrovert. I do not, of course, mean that we don’t have any general tendencies or that we shouldn’t know ourselves. But that there is something about that essential openness, that relentless curiosity, that is easily lost under the pressure of easy categorization. Childhood is a vast open field of possibilities and as time passes, every decision we make narrows our future and options. It focuses us, and that it a good thing. But not entirely. In one of the last interviews that Leonard Cohen gave before he died, he was asked what is the hardest thing about aging, and he responded after one of his customary long pauses that endowed everything with gravitas “keeping your heart open” (I paraphrase). And that is just it. Curiosity helps us keep our heart open. It pushes us beyond our limits and comforts, and leads us to places where we never thought we’d go. I have always tried to do this by learning new things, unexpected things, by reading everything that I can and by trying to learn from other people.
Not wasting time
This is related to curiosity, because you can’t be relentlessly curious if you are lazy. Wasting time is one of the easiest temptations in the modern world, because it is so easy to do it. We live in an era where our attention is commodified and there is a lot of competition to capture it and monetize it in the most banal ways—entire industries competing for our dopamine rush by giving us thousands of mindless options. So we move from grueling work to mindless entertainment, and then we wonder why we are unhappy. Of course we should work hard, relentlessly even, but our work and play are not two different and unconnected worlds. They both feed and nourish each other in the person that we are. In *Walden* Thoreau has a striking line that says, “As if one could kill time without injuring eternity.” And that’s is just it: both working and playing mindlessly is “killing time.” It is “injuring eternity.” So, if we are to take ourselves with the dignity that our life deserves, we need to spend it doing things that are worth doing. I was fortunate to have this shown to me at a a young age, and I try to show this to my kids too: find enjoyment in activities that make you better—instruments, languages, arts, any passion or skill really. This is the true meaning of *school*, which comes from the Greek *schole*, which means leisure. In other words, leisure, as opposed to our current understanding of entertainment, is not mindless, but deeply edifying. It enlarges your being and broadens your horizons. It makes you better.
Community
My greatest fortune has been to know and live with the greatest people of our time. I truly am surrounded by amazing human beings that know the deepest meaning of life and that work tirelessly to become better people each day—and it shows. Having a great community is not much of a skill, but perhaps simply luck, though maybe there is something to learn from it. Human relations take a lot of self-giving and forgiveness. Being open with others is hard, and being selfish is the most natural thing for people. So, it is important to constantly think about others. Not “what can they do for me?” but “what can I do for them?” In that self-giving, true friendships are born. Sure once in a while you’ll get hurt, but that pain pales in comparison with the depth and joy of friendship. This is when you find people you can truly count on, and who will be with you no matter what happens. This the best safety net anyone can have, the best team anyone can hope for, and the true secret to happiness.
Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?
Almost twenty years ago, when my parents where the same age I am now, they packed their bags and came to the U.S. with three teenagers and not much else to try their luck. They were trying to leave behind the systematic corruption and insecurity of our home country: Ecuador. Of course, there were so many obstacles ahead of them that they could not have foreseen, but they moved forward relentlessly, and most importantly, without ever letting the disease of fear fester in their hearts. If you would have asked my eighteen year old self, I would have told you that my parents had it all under control, that the move was merely an adventure to further horizons and greener pastures, and that there was nothing to worry about other than dreaming. Now, of course, I know that the story is far more complex and that in fact, they were filled with doubts and, at times, even fear. But in us they cultivated the habit of courage and an implacable faith that everything was always going to be alright. They taught us that somehow we were meant for something extraordinary from the beginning of time, and they lived that example every day. At this point, the story of the loving and courageous immigrant family is perhaps overtold and even trite. But it is very much the reality of *our* family, and that which one has experienced in their own skin can never be truly trite.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://winecollective.vin/
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Image Credits
Sarah Culver
